


Glimpses

by Zainir



Category: World of Warcraft
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Multi, POV Multiple
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-10-26
Updated: 2015-01-03
Packaged: 2018-02-22 17:23:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 4,111
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2515751
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zainir/pseuds/Zainir
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Short looks into the lives of various characters, giving glimpses into what makes them who they are and the things that shape their lives.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Alice's Nightmares I

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Like many Forsaken, Alice is haunted by the events of her life prior to being freed by the Dark Lady. Recurring nightmares plague her sleep, this one reminding her of her time as a ghoul.

She looked at the hands in front of her. Watched as the fingers scrabbled in the hard packed dirt, watched as bits of skin ripped away on the sharp bits of gravel mixed in. They didn’t pause. They just kept digging. There was no hesitation since they had a command to follow. There was no blood to stain the ground. These weren’t her hands. She tried to remember her hands. Small with slender fingers. Tan on the backs with a few scattered freckles. Soft palms and fingertips, not even a hint of a callous. Spoiled and pampered and delicate. She thought that they were old memories. She couldn’t be sure. It was too difficult to tell anymore and becoming too difficult to remember. She was scared that soon these hands with their broken flesh tinged with green and blue without blood, with their talon like claws that were growing as the bone became exposed, would soon be all she knew. A hand reached up to meet those hands.

She grabbed it, using those broken hands that weren’t her own. It was cold. Or maybe she was cold. She pulled that hand as hard as she could, tumbling back in the dirt as the arm tore free. It came loose from the dirt and whatever body it had been attached to. She looked at it for a moment, an unwanted ache rising in her stomach. She screamed mentally, futilely as the body she was trapped in didn’t listen. It brought the hand to it’s mouth. She brought the hand to her mouth and bit the pinky finger off. It was easy. The flesh was soft, it tore between her sharp teeth. The ache soothed away beneath a flush of pleasure. She wanted to cry but her eyes were not her own.

A figure came up to her and snatched the arm away, tossing it onto a nearby pile. She started to crawl after but the man spoke unknown words. Pain ran through her body, forcing a groan from her lips. She froze in place, unable to continue on even though she wanted to run. A rope was tied around her midsection. She turned her head slightly, looking over her hunched shoulder. They tied the other end of a rope to a sledge draped with corpses. One of them writhed pathetically, making wet gasping noises as it reached into the air. The figure pointed down the road and spoke again. She couldn’t understand the words but she could feel the intent.

_Go._

She obeyed. She was unable to resist. She began to crawl again, her clawed fingers digging into the dirt and grass as she tried to move the sledge. She was small and frail and the load was heavy, but she was compelled. She felt no exhaustion and her muscles no longer ached. Time had long stopped having any meaning. She could not tell if it was day or night or when the day ended. It may have taken her an hour or a week to get from the mass grave with its crawling swarm of laborers to the smoldering, plague ridden town. The rope was untied, another figure pointing her toward a barn with a broken door.

_Eat._

That ache rose in her stomach again until it was all she knew. She moved fast enough to end up on her feet, loping awkwardly along like an animal performing a trick. She fell back down at the door, creeping along with her face near the ground. Saliva leaked down her face, dripping in strings into the dirt as her tongue lolled out. The barn was empty. That never happened. She was alone except for her food. A man with broken legs bound by his wrists to an iron ring. He moaned feebly when he saw her gnashing her teeth together noisily.

She tried to stop herself. She screamed in her mind, pleading with her body to stop this. She didn’t want this, but she slunk forward anyway. She licked a wet path across the man’s chest. She could feel the hunger overtaking her mind, pushing aside the last bit of herself she had left. She tried to remember who she was.

_You are no one._

It all went red when her teeth sank into her food. It screamed. That always made it better.


	2. Bloodlust

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nadiana is a well of endless hatred and rage, even against those who are supposed to be allies.

There was a thrumming in her ears. It was always there. Had Nadia been alive, she’d have thought it was the sound of her heart and the blood rushing through her veins. But she was long dead and her heart didn’t beat anymore. That sound was the sound of her own anger and hatred. It was unending, nothing more than a constant background noise in her life.

Now, as she waited hidden in the underbrush, it served well to drown out the voice of the Forsaken next to her. He was talking to some orc. She didn’t know either of their names and she didn’t care. She didn’t care what they said or why they were here with her. She assumed they were planning, as if it meant anything. Plans went wrong, fell apart, and then people struggled to pick up the pieces and wound up dead.

They finally shut up when they heard the voices on the road. The Forsaken man signaled and their group of five stormed out from the forests edge and crashed into the patrol. The throbbing noise grew louder as Nadia tightened her grip on her axes, swinging the huge weapons so their curved heads whistled through the air. They smashed into a human, crunching through his armor and deep into soft flesh. Blood spattered out across her own armor when she wrenched her axes free. The human fell and so did two more. A Forsaken and an orc hit the ground as lifeless sacks of meat. She swung her weapons wildly, without finesse or technique. Those didn’t matter to her so long as blood was spilled. She didn’t feel when they hit her, their weapons crashing against her body. She would feel it later, perhaps, would possibly regret not paying more attention, but right now all that mattered was killing.

Two more humans died on her weapons. When she looked around, only one was still standing. Hatred burned inside her, an inferno of rage. She wanted this last one. Killing it would do little to sate her bloodlust, but every drop counted. The orc, though, the one who talked and talked, stood in the way. His weapon was raised and ready to strike down her prize.

Her ax arced downward and buried itself deep in the orc’s shoulder. His weapon clattered to the ground and his arm hung uselessly at his side. Her other weapon found its way into his side. He fell to his knees and she put her foot to his back, kicking the green creature away as she yanked her weapons free. The human stared in shock, the idiotic look on its face freezing there when her weapon cleaved through his chest. She spun on her heel and turned to face the last standing creature. A Forsaken holding a sword. It was speaking. She couldn’t hear it and didn’t care. Its head hit the ground with a thud, its body slumping next to her feet.

Nadia looked around. The thrumming in her ears was loud and her body burned. There was no one left. It hadn’t been enough. It was never enough.


	3. Alice's Nightmares II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Like many Forsaken, Alice is haunted by the events of her life prior to being freed by the Dark Lady. Recurring nightmares plague her sleep, including one of her death.

Alice shivered herself awake. Or she thought she did. It was hard to tell any more whether she was awake or asleep. It all felt the same now with her head throbbing in pain and filled with cotton. The scratching sounds at the door never stopped and she heard them in her dreams, dreams that felt no different than the waking world. Her skin was dry to the point of pain, her tongue swollen. Her midsection was sticky and the wound there pulsed slowly with sharp slashes of pain while thick blood oozed out into her clothes.

She looked blearily at the door she lay next to, watched it shudder ever so slightly against the heavy bolt. She knew she wasn’t dreaming when she heard the first low, growling moan. Those hadn’t followed her into sleep yet. She broke into dry, choking sobs and covered her face in her hands.

“Please, no,” she said in a weak gasp, “Go find daddy, please. Just go find your daddy.”

The sounds stopped at her words, but only for a moment. They quickly doubled as the creatures outside began to frantically claw at the door. Alice wept into her hands. The tears had stopped a day ago, leaving her with raw and red eyes. Their father was gone. He had run at the first sign of danger, leaving his wife and children behind. When they had fallen ill, she cared for them the best she could. There were so many sick, so many dying, that there was no hope that a healer or apothecary would come to help.

They died next to the fire she had built to keep them warm. She was sorry they had died as they did and she felt a strange pang of loss. Even though they had come from her, she had never considered these children to be her own but she had never wanted them to die. She cleaned them up, dressed them in their best, and laid them down to wait for the gravediggers. But they never came. No one did. When the screams started, she locked and bolted the door and hid away from the windows.

When the boys sat up and stared at her with dead eyes, she couldn’t even bring herself to scream. They lunged at her and sharp pain had rocketed through her as one of them bit into her stomach, managing to tear through her shirt to puncture her flesh with sharp teeth. She lashed out, striking her own children in an attempt to escape. Alice stumbled into the bedroom, clutching at her bleeding midsection as she slammed the door shut and threw the lock into place. She was sobbing as she sank down onto the floor, listening to them trying to break through the door.

A loud thud brought her back to full awareness again. She shivered and cringed as it sent fresh pain up from her wound. She had no fire, just her clothes and a thin blanket to protect her from the growing cold. It was getting harder to stay awake, to keep focused on reality. Memories were bleeding into the world around her. Her wedding day. The birth of her children. A face she had tried to forget. A face with bright, luminous blue eyes and pointed ears. A face that had left so long ago. Another sob bubbled up from her chest, rising into a weak wail that tore her throat. That face smiled a soft, tender smile.

“Please come save me,” she said in a hoarse whisper. The edges of her vision her dark and she felt herself drifting again.

“Please…”

 


	4. Dance With Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alice and Jude have a night out on the town and enjoy something they both thought gone from their lives.

“Where are we going? Just tell me already,” Jude said, trying her best to sound irritated but a smile crept across her lips anyway.

Alice’s excitement was infectious and Jude’s curiosity was swelling so much that it threatened to escape her lips in little laughs. Alice had hold of her arm and was pulling her along quickly, nearly skipping across the uneven cobblestones. The mage hiked her own dress up with one hand, showing off her skinny and pale legs in the moonlight. Jude was much more modest, but she was having trouble keeping pace.

“We never dress up. What are you planning?”

“You’ll see,” Alice said in a song-song tone, “Actually, just shush and listen.”

Jude made a face at Alice’s back but did as she was told and stopped talking. All she could hear were their soft footsteps on the street and the occasional sound of the wind through the leaves. A cricket. A lonely howl somewhere far away. And then she heard something she hadn’t heard since she was alive. It was quiet at first, slowly growing louder in the cold, crisp air outside Brill. Jude shook her head, trying to clear away a noise that could only be inside her own head but it remained anyway.

“Alice…”

“Shh!”

“Alice, wait, is that...music?”

The little mage just laughed and tugged harder on Jude’s arm. The pair rounded a bend in the road, passing through the dark trees of the woods and into a large clearing that was being retaken by the wilds. It was an old farm, the house standing off to one side and rotting in the dark. Ahead of them was a large barn and light flooded out from the half-open doors. Jude could hear the music clearly now, mixed with the sounds of voices and clapping and stomping boots. A pang of nostalgia appeared in her chest, sharp and clear like broken glass. She knew this song.

Alice drew Jude into the building and that pang grew stronger. Dozens of Forsaken were standing around the edge of the building, leaving a large empty area for a handful of couples who were dancing. A stage had been set up and a group of Forsaken had set up, playing drums and fiddles and flutes and more instruments Jude was certain were gone from Lordaeron for good. She placed a hand over her mouth as she watched, uncertain about the rush of emotions she was feeling. Alice turned to her and furrowed her brows in concern.

“I’m okay,” Jude said, just loud enough for Alice to hear her over the commotion, “It’s just...it’s home.”

Alice stood on her tiptoes and kissed Jude on the cheek before she turned and wove her way through the crowd. Jude blinked and lost her in group until the mage ended up on the dance floor, motioning for Jude to follow. The priest hesitated a moment before she pushed her way through. She barely set her foot out onto the floor before Alice grabbed her hands and yanked her hard. Jude stumbled forward, caught by surprise. Alice caught her around the waist with one arm and grabbed her hand with the other, pulling Jude into the group dancing on the floor. Jude’s eyes went huge. She wasn’t really expecting Alice to throw them out into the center so quickly, especially to a song so much faster than Jude ever danced to when she was young. She put her arm around the mage and fell in step as best she could.

The pair melded seamlessly into the group, mimicking the motions and moves that they had both known in the time before the plague. Jude could feel the memories of it all flooding back through her, filling her muscles and guiding them so that she was able to focus more on the woman in her arms. They pranced and bounced across the floor, spinning and weaving among the other dancers. The music filled their ears, cheers and shouts and excited calls mixing with it until it was almost too much to bear. Jude laughed before she could stop herself as the pure joy of it all overflowed her. Alice grinned up at her lover and Jude could feel the heat baking off her.

Apparently, the other dancers could feel it too. They began to move in wider berths around the mage turned furnace, a few retiring off the floor to watch. Jude ignored them all and focused on Alice. Alice’s bare feet barely seemed to touch the ground as she moved and she was laughing with Jude, her face bright and shining. The heat was almost too much as she drew back from Alice, spinning her partner under her hand. She realized in the back of her mind that they were now the only ones still dancing though the music continued. It seemed faster than when they started, but Alice kept up with it, almost daring it to go faster, and Jude kept up with her beloved.

Jude barely registered the first flames. They licked at the hem of Alice’s dress and the old straw covering the floor. Jude’s shoes and Alice’s bare soles stamped out the sparks as they moved, leaving little wisps of smoke to swirl around the pair. Alice grinned broadly and her eyebrows danced upward. Jude knew what she wanted and let out a sigh that turned into a laugh. She drew back from Alice and spun her once again. This time, she let go and left the skinny mage to twirl alone on her toes as flames erupted around her. They twisted like snakes up from the ground at her feet, entwining her and spiraling upward in a blazing inferno above her head. The heat baked across Jude’s skin and made her eyes water but she didn’t back away. Instead, she held out her hands and tendrils of shadow slid from her sleeves and from the hem of her dress like oily water. Alice fell back into her arms and they spun together, Jude feeling the warmth of her wife as a distant thing through her shadow magic.

Jude bent her head and Alice stood on her tiptoes as they half embraced and half danced in the center of the room. Their lips met as their magics did, fire and shadow merging together to make dark purple flames that licked at the rafters and spread out across the floor. The music stopped and the cheers rang out as Jude smiled against Alice’s lips.

“I was wrong,” she said in a whisper to Alice, “This is home.”


	5. Beginning

Alice stepped carefully through what used to be lush green woods. The trees towered over her still, but they were stripped bare of most leaves and needles and what remained was discolored and dying. Leaves and twigs crunched under her bare feet. She winced each time the sound cracked through the air. It wasn’t from pain since so much of the sensation in her body was dulled and distant, but because of how silent the world had become. There were no birds, no squirrels chittering angrily if she got too close to their food stores.

She was starting to get used to the silence, really. After Brill was liberated, the Dark Lady took everyone who could fight along with her. Alice had never fought in her life and when the recruitment began, she had hid in her old house until the army had left. After that, the only ones left in the town were broken and useless in a fight or a handful of mages and chemists. She was one of only a few who were whole and as healthy as a dead person could be while not having been assigned a task from the Dark Lady herself. She had tried to make herself as useful as possible. She ran errands and messages back and forth across the town. She even had been sent a few times up to Capital City with carts of supplies for the guard contingent clearing out the last pockets of Scourge. Mostly, though, she sat somewhere quiet and out of the way and tried not to think too hard on the situation.

This day they had sent her out to look for very specific mushrooms. Something for their experiments, she imagined, but they never told her. She didn’t care. It was something to do and a way to distract herself, she thought. The long walk to Brightwater Lake had been so quiet that she had been forced to listen to her own thoughts. She was tired of the constant reminders of what she was and, much worse, the things she had been forced to do. By the time she passed through the dead treeline, her hands were shaking at her sides. The beach sand was cool against the soles of her feet as she crept toward the waterline. She crouched down there, hugging her knees to her chest. The water lapped gently against the shore, an inch away from her toes.

She could see herself in the smooth surface of the lake. Most reflective surfaces in Brill had been broken by someone or another, driven into a rage by their own face staring back at them. Alice couldn’t really blame them but it meant she was surprised at the person looking back at her from the water. She had seen herself once after she regained her freedom. Dirty and blood stained but surprisingly not too far off from what she had been. Thinner, certainly, though she had often been politely described as skinny when she was alive and more honestly as scrawny. Her dark brown hair had been corrupted to a deep purple. Hazel eyes now glowed from within with a bright yellow glow. Now she touched her cheek with a cold disappointment filling her chest.

Her fingers were nothing but skin and bone. Her yellow eyes had sunk further into her face, which itself had narrowed and sharpened her features. Prominent cheekbones and a sharp chin made her look harsh. Her eyes looked paranoid. The dirty smudges across her face didn’t help matters, either, making her cheeks look hollow. She reached down and scooped cold water from the lake into her hands and splashed it on her face. She rubbed until her skin stung and stars sprang up behind her closed eyelids. She understood why all the mirrors and glass had been broken in town. She let out a shaky breath and dropped her hands back to her lap, looking back down at her reflection.

Alice saw the shambling figure behind her, but not soon enough to react. It struck her hard across the back and sent her sprawling forward into the mud. Her face plunged into the icy water and she inhaled reflexively, her chest bursting into flames of pain as water flooded into her lungs. A wry voice in the back of her head reminded her she couldn’t drown. She thrashed hard, kicking at the ghoul even as she tried to roll over. Her bare foot struck it in the leg and the creature stumbled, giving her enough time to get her head out of the water. She coughed hard to try and empty her lungs. The ghoul grabbed her dress in its rotting hands and leaned in close. Broken teeth were bared and its yellow eyes looked into her own. Alice threw her hand up to try and protect herself, to try and claw at the creature. Her fingers raked against the soft flesh of the ghoul and both of them cried out in pain.

Alice’s scream gurgled in her throat as her hand burst into flames. Her fingers dragged against the ghoul’s face, leaving trails of flame across its skin. It reeled back from her, letting her go as it tried to stop its own pain. Alice clutched at her wrist with the hand that wasn’t burning and struggled to her feet. She could see her skin turning black and peeling back in twisting ribbons. The ghoul had stumbled away, back into the woods, but she didn’t notice. She fell to her knees and plunged her hand into the lake only to stare as it continued to burn. Bubbles rose up from it, bursting as they broke the surface. She lifted her hand back out and watched the water sizzle and evaporate off of her wrist. The fire didn’t spread. It seemed content to turn just her hand into a charred remnant while pure agony shot through her arm.

She had to get back. There were people in Brill, healers and alchemists. Someone could help. Someone had to help, even if just to cut off her hand. She stood unsteadily and turned, stumbling her way away from the lake side. It was miles back to town. She stared straight ahead, moving as fast as her legs could manage. It felt like hours passed, maybe days. All she knew was the pain of the fire and the smell of her burning flesh. When she finally made it back into town, she finally gave up. Her legs buckled under her and she pitched forward onto the stone pavers of the road. Before she lost consciousness, she heard the sound of boots against the ground. She felt hands rolling her onto her back and, finally, felt the fire extinguish. With eyes closed tight, she never saw who helped her, but she heard his voice. She heard the one word that gave her a thrill in her stomach even as she slipped away from reality.

“Mage.”


End file.
